


Sun's Sudden Embrace

by asparagus_writes



Series: Our Bravery Wasted [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Anakin Skywalker Leaves the Jedi Order, Anakin Skywalker Needs a Hug, Anakin thinks about his mom's death a lot, Blood, Episode: s05e20 The Wrong Jedi, Force Bond (Star Wars), Gen, Palpatine is a manipulative bitch who will turn any situation to his advantage, not a very charitable portrayal of Obi Wan either, not a very charitable portrayal of the Jedi Council
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-02
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:14:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25035265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asparagus_writes/pseuds/asparagus_writes
Summary: An alternate ending to my Wrong Jedi AU, Our Bravery Wasted. This is the sad one.In which Anakin is a mess who has to watch yet another person he loves die without being able to do anything.
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker
Series: Our Bravery Wasted [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1813108
Comments: 60
Kudos: 246





	1. Anakin

**Author's Note:**

> This might not make sense if you haven't read the first two chapters of Our Bravery Wasted https://archiveofourown.org/works/24854206/chapters/60125746

It must have been a short meeting—audiences with a man as busy as the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic usually are—because Padmé texts him that the meeting is over not thirty minutes after they hang up. Anakin has Palpatine’s personal comm code, though Palpatine’s only ever been the one to initiate contact using it. Anakin spares himself a moment for a deep breath before he keys it in: he will _not_ break down in front of the Chancellor. The man respects strength, and rightly so; therefore, Anakin has to be strong.

“Anakin,” the Chancellor greets him familiarly, and Anakin can’t tell whether the man is surprised to hear from him or not.

“Chancellor, I only need a few moments of your time,” Anakin begins. Palpatine smiles accommodatingly.

“You I can always make time for you, my friend.”

His genial nature grates on Anakin for possibly the first time ever, but he knows he has to play along if he wants to get anywhere.

“This is about Ahsoka. I don’t believe that she’s been treated fairly, and you’re the only one that has the authority to intervene.”

Palpatine’s brow furrows.

“Frankly, I’m surprised, my dear boy. Did she not lie to you? Did she not betray us? I hesitate to take lightly the ways in which her actions hurt you.”

To hear someone talk about Ahsoka this way—as if her involvement in the bombing is a foregone conclusion—sends tongues of fire flickering up from Anakin’s heart to his throat, but he swallows them down. The Chancellor is just working off the information he has available: he doesn’t really know Ahsoka. It’s touching really, that he is angry on Anakin’s behalf, even if he’s wrong about her.

“I don’t believe she has done anything wrong, Your Excellency. I know Ahsoka, and she would never do something like this. If you could order the sentence to be delayed, or—or even pardon her— it would give me the chance to set things right.”

The Chancellor tilts his head and then nods thoughtfully. He has given Anakin his full attention, which he knows is a gift rarely bestowed on others, though often on Anakin himself.

“Of course, I am inclined to trust your judgement, Anakin, and I would like to do as you say, but unfortunately the rest of the Senate would not see things as you do. It pains me to say that that many in the Senate would much rather use your padawan as a scapegoat to protect their own reputations and power than allow justice to be done. I would not hesitate if I did not need their support to end this terrible war. I fear this would make the Senate call for my head, and such disunity would be a disaster for the war effort,” Palpatine explains, the picture of sympathy.

This is what Anakin thought he might say. Palpatine is always complaining about the corruption in the Senate and how it makes it so difficult to get anything meaningful done. Usually Anakin accepts these explanations and resolves to let the politicians handle it, but not today. This time, he pushes.

“Chancellor, I know that justice is deeply important to you. Is protecting innocent lives from the Separatists not the reason we fight the war in the first place?”

“You’re quite right, Anakin, but the war effort is for the greater good. As the Republic’s greatest leader on the battlefield, I know you understand the necessity of such difficult decisions. As it is, if the Jedi Council had not turned her over to the courts, or, if I had been allowed by the Constitution to have more discretion over the ruling in the first place, we would not be in this position.”

Anakin can’t disagree with him there, but it doesn’t do Ahsoka any good.

“It would still be wrong to let Ahsoka be executed. Is there truly nothing you could—" Anakin asks, abandoning all semblance of formality. He hears the desperate edge he can no longer keep out of his voice. If Palpatine detects it, he doesn’t acknowledge it.

“I’m terribly sorry, my dear boy. Please, feel free to come to me if you ever need a friend to talk to,” Palpatine interrupts, shaking his head, saddened.

“Thank you, Chancellor,” Anakin grits out—he’s never not meant the words before today—and the Chancellor cuts the connection.

Anakin growls and hurls the commlink at the opposite wall. It clatters to the ground with a thoroughly unsatisfying click. Breathing heavily for no other reason than his anger, he stares at the device where it’s fallen, its light still blinking mockingly at him. He hasn’t even managed to break it. The empty ration bar wrapper he’d forgotten he was holding crackles in his mechanical fist. Anakin wants to tear this whole place to the ground, but all he has managed is a working commlink, a crumpled wrapper, and some broken glass in the other room.

He’d been expecting this. Of course he had. When was the last time politics solved a problem instead of creating more? The only thing that seems to work anymore is violence, and Anakin has seen enough of it to know. Ironically, it is violence that he is trying so hard to stop.

Not even the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic can (is willing?) to stop this, and Anakin certainly can’t. He is forced to acknowledge that the nauseating sinking feeling of inevitability he’s had since this whole thing started might be _real_.

Not this again, anything but this, he’s felt this way before.

And then Anakin isn’t seeing the room he’s in anymore. He’s seeing his mother’s body tied to a wooden frame, her exhausted face lit up by the fire, he’s seeing a streak of colored light hurtling towards Ahsoka’s head. He’s hearing Shmi Skywalker’s rattling breaths, he’s hearing Ahsoka’s body hit a cool metal floor. He’s seeing his mother’s familiar face disfigured by a long weeping cut along her cheekbone and Ahsoka’s white forehead markings marred beyond recognition by a circle of blackened, burned flesh.

He’s hearing his mother’s last words.

_I love… I love…_

He’s feeling Ahsoka’s voice in his mind.

_I love you too._

Anakin’s awareness comes back to his trembling body in the here and now and he stumbles into the refresher, retching. Even though he ate Kix’s ration bar, there’s still not much in his stomach. It burns his throat in an almost satisfying way.

He dry heaves a few more times after that, but there’s nothing left. It just makes his head pound. He hits the button to flush with shaking fingers that barely feel like his own and sinks down against the wall of the ‘fresher, closing his eyes. Not resting, never resting.

He’s not sure if the Ahsoka he saw is actually the future or just a horror of his own imagination. Anakin supposes it doesn’t really matter—she’ll be dead all the same.

He stays there, with a bad taste in his mouth and worse images dancing behind his eyelids until Obi Wan finds him.

“ _Oh Anakin_ ,” he says from the doorway. Anakin cracks an eye open to look at him.

“What.”

“Are you—”

“I had a vision,” Anakin rasps, wanting the present to resemble the past no more than it already does. Obi Wan goes over and crouches down next to him, face open with concern that he doesn’t want or deserve. Anakin swallows.

“Of Ahsoka,” he says. There’s only one event in Ahsoka’s future left to sense, and Obi Wan at least understands this, not needing Anakin to name it out loud.

“Anakin—”

“I don’t want to hear anything from you unless its to say that she’s going to be safe,” he says flatly but forcefully. Obi Wan just sighs and tugs at Anakin’s arm. He lets himself be pulled to his feet, leaning on his former master only because he needs to. Obi Wan guides him across the hall, to his bedroom, where he has to sweep a pile of droid parts off the bed before lowering Anakin onto it.

“You need to sleep. You’ve been running yourself ragged.”

Anakin shakes his head.

“There’s nothing more you can do now, Anakin.”

Does Obi Wan think he hasn’t realized this? Why else does he think Anakin ended up slumped on the floor of the refresher? The visions he had before never made him physically ill. And he’s witnessed plenty of death.

He clenches his jaw painfully. “I know.”

Obi Wan tries to sit down next to him on the bed. It should be Anakin doing this, sitting down next to Ahsoka and trying to help her work through the knowledge that someone, probably a Jedi, had attacked her home.

“Don’t,” Anakin says, but Obi Wan does anyways. Anakin thinks the only way he’ll get Obi Wan to leave is if he pretends to go to sleep. He leans over to the side table, which has the added benefit of distancing him from Obi Wan’s misplaced attempts at sympathy, reaching for the digital chrono.

“What time?”

Obi Wan’s eyes dart between Anakin and the chrono, which clearly is telling them that it’s 19:32 right now.

“Not what I meant.” Anakin says. Obi Wan clears his throat.

“Oh-six-hundred hours.”

At dawn, then. Anakin makes a show of setting the alarm on the chrono for 05:45. His former master takes this as Anakin intends him to and stands up.

“Thank you, Anakin.”

Anakin chuffs a humorless laugh. He doesn’t deserve anyone’s thanks.

Once Obi Wan is gone, Anakin reaches over to turn off the alarm. He won’t be sleeping: he meant what he said to Kix. It would be a waste of Ahsoka’s last hours for him spend them doing something as mundane and pointless as resting.

He checks him comm first. He only has one message: a text from Padmé that simply reads _How did it go?_ It is from an hour or so ago, and he feels a flash of regret that he kept her waiting for so long. The thought of not telling her, letting her hope for a while longer, crosses his mind. But, she’s probably worried, and Anakin hates the thought of lying to her. They’re going to face this together. He answers:

_He said he can’t._

_Or won’t._

_I’m sorry._

She responds a few minutes later, a length of time that makes him think that she saw it right away, but it took her this long to compose an answer.

_Do you need anything?_

He wants to send back a scathing reply: _Ahsoka._ But that wouldn’t be fair to her. She just wants to help, and if she were anyone else, that fact might make him furious. Padmé is the only one who actually, genuinely did something to help them, even if it didn’t work.

Next, he wants to say: _you._ But that’s not right either, for all that it’s true. They’ve already agreed it’s not possible. Asking her for something she can’t give won’t make either of them feel better.

_No._

Anakin’s ended up lying to Padmé anyways. She doesn’t reply after that. They both know there’s nothing to be said.

Next, he puts his lightsaber on the table next to the chrono and curls up on his side to watch the digital numbers change. After that, he just thinks. Anakin is ashamed that not all of his thoughts are of Ahsoka, though everything always comes back to her.

He looks at his lightsaber, a cylinder of metal that used to mean more than the sum of its parts. It used to mark him as a Jedi, as a protector, but he doesn’t want to be the former anymore and he’s failed at being the latter. Anakin thinks of what he’s going to say to the Jedi Council, the next time they call him in front of them. How many days will it be before they’re wanting to send him back out to the front again? Or maybe he shouldn’t even wait to be summoned—maybe as soon as Ahsoka is gone, he’ll go to them himself. Should he bring the ‘saber with him when he does, so he can give it to them, throw it at their feet, or should he should just leave it here for Obi Wan to find after he’s long gone? It might even be amusing to leave it here and make a game out of seeing how long it will take an astute Council Member to notice he’s not wearing it. He wonders which one will figure it out first. Then, he’s thinking of making games out of situations that shouldn’t be the least bit funny, which leads him to keeping counts of droid kills and then Ahsoka.

That’s how it goes. Everything comes back to her.

Anakin realizes that he’s skipped over the part where he decided to leave the Jedi Order. He can’t stay after this, he knows that. When _did_ he decide? Maybe after Obi Wan asked him to cut the Force Bond. Maybe even before.

He tries to plan out in his head exactly what he’s going to tell the Council when he leaves. He wants to see the stunned looks on their faces. He wants them to feel as betrayed as he does. This exercise requires him to think over what his reasons are. There’s a lot of them.

Their treatment of Ahsoka is issue number one. They were supposed to take care of her, but they did the exact opposite. They took Ahsoka from her family when she was small—she didn’t even get the level of choice that Anakin had, which isn’t saying much—gave her to him instead, and then expected him to not love her like a daughter. This part is too personal for him to even tell the Council. The part where he says he loves her. That’s between the two of them. Soon the burden of it will be his alone.

What he _will_ tell them, is that besides their actions having destroyed any perception of their moral high ground, he can no longer trust them.

He became a Jedi because he wanted to do good: help people like mom always said. No, he thinks, that’s why he _stayed_. He _joined_ because he wanted to be free and make others free, but he’s long accepted the fact that the Jedi aren’t going to do anything about the slaves. He has no reason to look past that now—he never should have. Being a Jedi is not what he thought it would be.

It’s bitterly ironic. Many believe that Anakin is the Chosen One, sent by the Force to bring balance and save the Jedi. The Council preaches trust in the Force, but trust goes both ways. They abuse their power to play politics with people’s lives. From where Anakin is standing, they haven’t given the Force a reason to trust _them_. Anakin doesn’t believe that he’s some kind of manifestation of the Force—he’s not entirely convinced the Force even has a will anymore, or that he should follow it if it does—but _he_ sure doesn’t trust them.

Anakin _wishes_ he were a manifestation of the Force. Does the Force feel pain? But he knows he’s human, alive just like anyone else, because he can feel. He can feel and it _hurts_.

He spends the hours running over the place in his mind where he and Ahsoka are connected. It’s like when he was a child and he had a loose tooth. He couldn’t stop poking it with his tongue, even though it stung every time did. He doesn’t project anything across the bond—nothing that would call Ahsoka’s attention—but he wonders if she might be doing the same thing. At this distance, actually using the bond to communicate with Ahsoka would take a lot of effort. He needs to save his strength if he’s going to do it later, when it really matters.

The only movement in the room is Anakin’s chest rising and falling and the numbers on the chrono changing. He reaches for Ahsoka’s presence over and over again, trying to memorize how it feels, because with each breath, each moment, the time is coming closer when he’ll reach and find nothing there.

He needs to remember what she felt like, what she looked like, how she laughed, what she liked and disliked. Anakin won’t let her be lost to the universe. Already, he is starting to forget his mother’s face. Every time he thinks of her, her features shift and blur, just slightly out of focus. He’ll do better this time.

Too slowly and too quickly, it becomes 05:45. Anakin pushes himself upright on the bed and then spends another minute sitting there, looking at his hands. Not really sure why he feels the need to, he strips the glove off his right hand and leaves it there on the bed. The gleaming metal and exposed wires make him think of failure.

He goes into the living area and stands in front of the large window there. It doesn’t face the detention center where he knows Ahsoka is, but it does face the sunrise. The sky is awash with pink and orange. This room is high enough above the other buildings in the city that the bright beacon of the sun and colorful expanse of watercolor sky aren’t too obscured by Coruscant’s skyscrapers. He can still see their reflective rounded towers stretching towards stars that aren’t visible right now—ones he knows are there nonetheless. A few star destroyers are departing the planet; he can see their grey outlines in the upper atmosphere and the bright bluish-white spots of their engines firing.

Anakin assumes the same pose he did on a morning that’s now years past, on the balcony overlooking the lake at Varykino: feet spread wide apart, hands behind his back, straight spine. He doesn’t close his eyes this time.

The Force tells him when Ahsoka needs him. He takes a deep breath and stretches out with his mind, follows the Force racing across traffic lanes and through walls to find her. It’s not as hard as he thought it would be. His thoughts for the past night have been so full of her and her life that they make it easier to lock away the darkness he feels: the rage and despair.

 _Ahsoka,_ he thinks, hoping she can hear him. She doesn’t send any coherent thought back, but he can feel her flicker in the Force and knows she’s listening.

 _Watch the sunrise with me,_ he thinks. For an instant, he stretches his senses out from her and hears a man’s crisp voice, giving orders. They don’t have much time.

Anakin collects himself back to her and then surrounds her completely in his Force presence. Ahsoka’s mind is right there, pressed up against his own. At least he can do this—take her mentally away from where she is. This way, she won’t be able to sense it coming. She won’t even flinch. He can help her be brave.

He’s pulling her awareness back to the Temple, to where he is. Anakin imagines that they’re in one of their battlefield camps, and he’s wrapped her in a warm blanket, carrying her—already half asleep—away from the fire and back to her tent. Then, it’s like Ahsoka is standing right next to him. She burns bright in her place at his side.

They watch the sun rise.

He watches the sun rise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I write Dave Filoni's art into my fic? https://twitter.com/dave_filoni/status/1251238539213168640
> 
> Yes. Yes I did.


	2. Rex

Rex makes sure he is one of the ones stationed on General Skywalker’s guard when it’s time. It definitely rubs him the wrong way that they’re being asked to do this. First because there needs to be trust between a commanding officer and his men, and that’s really difficult when those men are ordered to treat him like a prisoner. Second because he doesn’t _want_ to stop General Skywalker if he decides to try to rescue Commander Tano. But General Kenobi had been very clear that these were their orders. 

Kenobi had been the same as always when he spoke to Rex, his expression never darkening beyond the studious concern he displayed when considering a particularly challenging objective. Rex thinks that this must be affecting Kenobi, though. He’d always shown Ahsoka the same kind of quiet affection that was otherwise reserved only for General Skywalker himself, and in some ways he gave her even more than what he gave Skywalker.

But General Kenobi had accepted the explanation that Commander Tano had committed treason against the Republic same as the rest of the higher-ups. Everything would be so much easier if Rex could accept it too.

But he just couldn’t. Ahsoka had thrown herself in dangerous situations for the men of the 501st too many times to count. She showed genuine grief when they lost soldiers, especially when it was on her orders. Fierce pointed smiles often belied her satisfaction at destroying separatist droids. He had seen her go out of her way to help ordinary citizens who had nothing to do with their objective. 

Rex has been trying to reconcile all that with the fact that Ahsoka had conspired to kill clones and Jedi but he hasn’t convinced himself.

He can’t afford to dwell on it too much. There is nothing he can do, short of getting himself court-martialed or demoted with no results to show for it. Rex has a more pressing concern, one he might be able to do something about, and that is General Skywalker himself. Predictably, Rex’s Jedi has been taking the situation extremely hard.

Kix had confirmed yesterday that Skywalker was not eating, not drinking, not sleeping. Luckily, their medic had at least managed to get some food and water in him. Sleep was another matter. Rex knew that General Skywalker was extremely resistant to taking any medical sleep aids, even on a good day— in a dire situation Kix has been known to override these wishes, but not this time. Rex understands, even if he doesn’t like that his General is in bad shape because of it, that forcing the man into something he didn’t want had been beyond the pale for Kix. Most of the 501st, no doubt including Kix, were feeling the same emotions as their General was. They all could relate to their commanding officer too much to betray him, even if it might have been for his own good.

Which is why Rex doesn’t know _what_ he’d do if General Skywalker did something the Jedi Council (and Republic law) had forbidden. With the lateness of the hour, (technically, it is barely dawn, but that isn’t what Rex means) he is grateful that Skywalker won’t be forcing him or any of his men to find out. Rex somewhat doubts the men’s moral dilemmas were a consideration of his, but if they were, he respects the hell out of his General for it.

Rex lives his life by a few simple principles, and this is one of them: try to save as many soldiers as you can and, when that fails, care for the men who are left.

Commander Tano has become one of the failures, and the thought threatens to overwhelm Rex. Right now, they are probably lining up, clicking off the safeties of their blasters—

Stop. He’s on duty, for just a little longer. Rex stands right outside the door to Skywalker and Kenobi’s quarters, where he knows his Jedi can sense his presence if he bothers to look and thinks that at least he can do this much. He is selfishly glad all he will have to witness in this moment is the barren wall of the Jedi Temple hallway.

The thought must come too soon, because the uneasy quiet of the hallway is stolen by a muffled, pained shout coming from inside. Rex’s guess that it was Skywalker is confirmed when a muffled, “Anakin!” spoken with a familiar accent also reaches his ears.

Rex had deliberately not imagined what this moment would be like, but he had not expected anything he overheard to sound so... urgent. He very much does not want to intrude on whatever is going on with his Generals but then he hears a chair clatter to the floor and his concern ratchets up another level.

Even if this is just General Skywalker throwing some kind of grief-induced tantrum, someone needs to save him from it, and Rex doesn’t think that Kenobi understands that his presence will probably just make it worse. Against the sense of decorum Rex has been trained with, he opens the door.

His General is not having a tantrum.

He is a hunched, dark figure against the first light coming through the room’s windows. Rex can see him shaking from here. General Kenobi’s own cream-colored robes next to him are stained with the pink of the sunrise.

Rex is reminded very uncomfortably of the rumors he heard from his brothers stationed permanently on Coruscant, the ones that had heard from the ones stationed at the prison where Commander Tano was being held. They’re rumors he wishes he could unhear, about how General Skywalker had acted when he went to speak to his Padawan. How he had looked when he cried in the middle of the hallway.

Then Rex sees the spatters of blood on the floor. He had taken them for tears at first, simply cast in an odd color by the early morning lighting, but then General Kenobi’s hand comes away from where it had been bracing Skywalker’s face, stained familiarly, unmistakably red. Rex’s mind switches gears. This is a battle now; he should be doing something.

“Sir!” He says, which could mean either one of them but turns out to be Kenobi, who turns his head towards Rex while Skywalker doesn’t even seem to register his presence.

“Call your medic, Captain,” Kenobi orders, with the slightest of wavers in his otherwise firm voice, keeping his hands on Skywalker. One arm grips firmly under Skywalker’s bicep while the other is wrapped tightly around his waist. They maintain their precarious position—it is clear that without Kenobi, Skywalker would have pitched face first onto the floor by now—while Rex comms Kix, who he knows is not more than a few corridors away.

“Kix, we need you,” Rex barks. The “It’s General Skywalker” he follows it with is entirely superfluous for all of them. Who else would it be?

Rex isn’t sure where the blood is coming from until he steps closer and gets a better look at Skywalker’s face. His General’s features are twisted into a grimace, his eyes are screwed shut so tightly he’s probably seeing stars, both of his hands clutch at his head, and blood trickles from his nose. The nosebleed is obviously a symptom rather than the cause of Skywalker’s distress, which, judging by his expression, is of the physical rather than emotional variety. It looks like the kind of physical pain that is so intense it overwhelms even emotions—Skywalker wouldn’t be letting them see this level of vulnerability if it weren’t. It is not the reverse, as Rex would have expected in this situation.

This doesn’t make sense. He knows nosebleeds can be a symptom of head injury, except that Kenobi clearly caught General Skywalker before he could collapse and hit his head on anything. Rex can hardly think of another way one could self-inflict an injury that would lead to this.

_What the hell?_

“Anakin? Anakin, can you hear me?” General Kenobi is saying. Rex steps in, gets his shoulder under the arm that Kenobi isn’t supporting. Skywalker is a deadweight, whose only response to Kenobi’s entreaties is an agonized gasp. Then he lets out an even more agonized sob.

“Get him on the ground,” Rex hears himself saying, and between the two of them they manage it. Skywalker immediately curls in on himself and Rex kneels beside him, no doubt smearing gruesome crimson onto the white armor plates that cover his knees and shins.

“What the hell is wrong with him?” Rex demands just as Kix arrives, going straight for the three of them huddled on the floor, not pausing on the threshold like Rex had.

Kix takes two seconds to take in Skywalker’s ragged breathing, posture, and bloody face before he echoes his Captain, demanding, “What happened?”

Kenobi looks up at both of them, and Rex thinks it must be the most emotion he’s ever seen on the man’s face—devastated, sympathetic pain— but the expression is also knowing.

“When Ahsoka died—” he begins, but then starts over.

“Masters and Padawans form a close bond in the Force. It connects their minds,” explains Kenobi, rubbing circles into General Skywalker’s trembling shoulders.

“It’s—think of it like a very taught rubber band. When one side is released, it recoils, stings the remaining point of connection, the part of Anakin’s mind that uses the Force.”

And then apparently causes the Mother Gundark of all migraines.

Skywalker moans again, sounding for all the world like a wounded animal.

“Is it always like this?” Rex asks incredulously. Kenobi’s expression shutters.

“No.”

Kix, practical in the way medics are, asks, “Can we do anything?”

General Kenobi purses his lips,

“Not much, now. Anakin could have— _should_ have— released the bond in a controlled manner, gently, before now. He would have not been able to feel her.”

Rex wonders how they could claim to know each other so well, if Kenobi had expected Skywalker to do that.

“Can we at least sedate him?” Kix asks. Kenobi pins him with a look.

“Yes, that would probably be best, so his mind can begin to recover.”

“He _will_ recover though?” Rex asks, suddenly nervous. Kix’s hands don’t pause as he starts to prepare the needle and syringe of sedative, but Rex knows he is paying attention to the answer.

“Jedi usually do,” replies Kenobi, looking like he doesn’t quite believe it.

“You said it wasn’t usually this bad,” accuses Rex.

General Kenobi doesn’t answer right away, instead he presses a few fingers to Skywalker’s forehead, in the small space left by Skywalker’s own hands, which haven’t moved since Rex got there. Mere seconds later, Kenobi recoils from the touch, as if his former Padawan’s skin had burned him.

“I suspect—” General Skywalker rocks forward, a pained sound escaping from the back of his throat. Kenobi places a bracing hand on the exposed nape of Skywalker’s neck.

“I suspect,” Kenobi begins again, “that Anakin deliberately pushed himself over to Ahsoka’s side of the bond. The psychic shock isn’t only from the bond breaking. He intertwined his mind with a dying one and the proximity—”

The General shakes his head. “It’s like it _burned_ him—” Another ragged gasp from Skywalker.

“Anakin, you _idiot,_ ” Kenobi swears softly.

Rex won’t pretend to understand all of what Kenobi’s said, but what he does grasp is horrifying enough. And suddenly he is very angry, because Kenobi is the person who should have _prevented_ something like this from happening. Or if he couldn’t have prevented it, he at least could have _predicted_ it. If Rex had known something like this was a possibility, he would have been expecting it, but Kenobi sounds _surprised_ General Skywalker would risk himself like this.

Every clone knows that you’re supposed hold a brother’s hand as he dies. General Skywalker knows it too—Rex has watched him do it. Kenobi seems to think that General Skywalker made some kind of choice to put himself in this situation. Rex thinks Anakin Skywalker is _Anakin Skywalker_ and his nature means there had never _been_ a choice, not from the moment he declared Commander Tano was going to be his Padawan.

“I wouldn’t call General _Skywalker_ an idiot. Sir.”

The words escape Rex’s mouth, unmistakably bitter before he can think better of it, in a way that makes it clear just who he thinks _is_ the idiot here. His use of the title afterward is defiant; he knows what he’s just said and he won’t back down from it. Maybe it’s unfair to expect General Kenobi to have stopped this whole nightmare, but Rex is _furious_ with him anyways. Kenobi’s gaze, sharp enough to cut metal, meets Rex’s.

“Captain—” Obi Wan starts defensively, but Kix pushes in between them, ready with the hypo. He presses it into General Skywalker’s neck, and it is a testament to how much the man is hurting already that Skywalker doesn’t even flinch. If Kix has gotten the dosage right, which is difficult to do when you’re working with high midichlorian counts, the drug will work very quickly.

It begins with a marginal unclenching of Skywalker’s jaw, and the way he slumps more into Kenobi, who had already been propping him upright. General Kenobi gently pries Skywalker’s hands away from his head, and Skywalker lets him do it, maintaining a weak grip on his former mentor’s wrist instead. He’s blinking, fighting the drug, probably just now realizing where he is and that he’s surrounded by people. Rex leans forward to help Kenobi lay him on his side, so he doesn’t choke on the blood that is still dripping from his nose. Rex is close enough to hear Kenobi murmur, probably not expecting an answer,

“Why did you do this to yourself, Anakin?”

But Skywalker, maybe more aware than they’ve given him credit for on the edge of unconsciousness, or maybe not having heard the question at all, says in a strained voice so small and high it could belong to a child,

“ _I promised her I wouldn’t let anyone hurt her._ ”

He shakes his head sluggishly and his eyes slip closed, “ _I didn’t want her to be alone. I promised…_ ”

Rex doesn’t go with him and Kix and General Kenobi when the Jedi healers come with a hover stretcher. They take General Skywalker away, blood and tears drying on his face. Rex stays where he is crouched on the floor, staring at the red smears that have found their way onto his hands and his armor.

In the privacy of Rex’s own heart, years ago, he had made Ahsoka those very same promises.

They’re all broken now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have got to get better about marking works complete when I will eventually end up coming back to them and adding more. Oh well, here you go, surprise epilogue!
> 
> Anyways, here you get the through line of the Force bond concept from chapter 2 of Our Bravery Wasted and also some Rex feels. 
> 
> (This borrows some psychic shock concepts from Queen's Gambit by bedlamsbard which is really really good and you should read it if you haven't already. The Anakin/psychic shock subplot is one of my favorite bits of the whole huge Ouroboros series.)


	3. Padmé

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing this, I listened to "Alma Mia" from the Medici soundtrack basically on repeat. Sad. V Sad.

Padmé does not sleep well the night before Ahsoka is to die, but she does sleep, eventually. Though Anakin is merely on the other side of the city and not the other side of the galaxy tonight, his empty side of the bed feels particularly cold. She turns their short conversation over in her mind: the few words he had given her. Anakin is typically much more effusive in person than over comm, but just how laconic he was in their last conversations unsettles her.

Her heart aches for him, and for Ahsoka of course. Their whole worlds have been violently pulled out of orbit, and tomorrow morning everything will come irrevocably burning down. And her own life will be knocked off its axis as well, from the sheer force of the impact, the scorching heat of their flame.

She worries for them all. And she worries for the Republic.

The utter lack of justice is astounding. Even more mind-boggling is the fact that very few seem to see the problem with all of this. Guilty or not guilty (and she believes Anakin when he insists that Ahsoka is not) Ahsoka’s trial was a thinly veiled sham, after which every avenue of appeal was shut down. She grew up believing in a Republic better than this—one in which the political considerations she is sure Palpatine hid behind when Anakin spoke to him don’t undermine the very pillars of its rule.

The Chancellor would tell her that he “admires her idealism,” which she has learned is code for “believes she is painfully naïve.” And to refute his point, yes, she understands that the military courts have to work differently than the civilian justice system. The military is a complicated machine—if it malfunctions, the consequences are dire. She understands very well that war must change how governments work. Sacrifices must be made. But what exactly has the Republic sacrificed here? Can it possibly be justified?

Padmé falls asleep to these thoughts and when she wakes, she gets up and starts writing a speech she will never give. She feels helpless, helpless, helpless, and reading the speech knowing that she could never give it in this political climate makes it worse. What good can her words do, when the Republic is increasingly controlled by military officials and their blasters? Fear is a powerful drug for the masses, and she knows they clamor for this: for someone to pay so they can feel safe again. She hopes Anakin has not seen the holonews coverage; it sickens her.

Blessedly, the Senate is in a scheduled recess today. Padmé stays at her senatorial apartments and waits for Anakin to come home in what is sure to be a whirlwind of grief and righteous anger. She was never told a specific time for the execution. Frustratingly her main source of what little news there had been was Anakin himself. She doubted they would have even given him the time without a fight—suspecting him as they do of doing something drastic. Maybe Obi Wan, the only other Jedi besides Anakin and Ahsoka she calls a friend or fully trusts, would take pity on her husband and tell him. She hopes he has, because the limbo she is in is agonizing enough. For Anakin it would be many times worse.

Of course, it doesn’t matter. Ahsoka will be dead by the afternoon whether Padmé or Anakin can mark the exact time it happens or not.

Ahsoka. The girl she had taken under her wing, at first at Anakin’s behest—and hadn’t it warmed her heart to hear him speak of her like a surrogate daughter—but quickly because of Ahsoka herself. A clever, eager, intrinsically _good-hearted_ girl, but nonetheless innocent when it came to the world of politics. Innocent, innocent, innocent.

She had risked her life to save Padmé’s more than once. And what had Padmé’s efforts earned Ahsoka in return?

Padmé is in her apartment’s office, crying quietly into her hands when she gets the call. She isn’t expecting anyone to contact her—certainly doesn’t expect Anakin to have the presence of mind to comm ahead. She tries to compose herself, but it becomes very difficult when she sees the caller ID. It is Captain Rex—his comm code is in her contacts list because Anakin had insisted she put it there, in case of emergency. Her stomach drops.

“Captain Rex,” she answers, hoping the military-issue device will not be high-resolution enough for him to see the distraught state of her appearance—the red splotches on her cheeks.

“Senator,” he says.

“It’s done?” she asks miserably, though the fact that they’re talking makes it obvious. Rex nods.

“And Anakin?” This is, after all, why the man must be calling her. She imagines Anakin’s gotten himself into some sort of trouble, though that wouldn’t likely be the right word for it. The last time someone this important to him had died—

Surely, he wouldn’t do something similar, not with so many people around to stop him. Could she forgive such a thing a second time?

She is unprepared for the truth. Rex speaks slowly.

“He collapsed, senator, when—"

“Collapsed?” her eyes are frantic as they search the small blue image of the clone’s face. She doesn’t understand.

“General Kenobi could explain better than I could, but right now he is unconscious and in the care of the Jedi Healers at the Temple.”

_Unconcious? What happened?_

Padmé needs to ask an ugly, ugly question. It is so ugly not least because she feels that it should have occurred to her to do something about the possibility before now.

“Did he—” she shudders, “did he do something to hurt himself?”

Padmé presses her knuckles to her lips after the words have left them as she watches the Captain’s mouth pinch ever so slightly.

_Oh gods, oh gods._

“I don’t believe that was his intent—not as such,” says Rex. The words should maybe make her feel better, but she just feels more confused.

“Then what happened?”

“As I understand it, General Skywalker failed to take precautions to protect himself from the ramifications in the Force as a result of Commander Tano’s death. Out of a sense of—”

Even though Rex’s words sound rehearsed—practiced in order to explain what he knows in delicate yet informative terms—he still struggles for the word for a moment.

“—responsibility to her.”

There’s more there, Padmé knows, than just the responsibility Anakin feels for Ahsoka. She knows simple words could never fully encompass their relationship, or Anakin’s reasoning for doing…whatever it was that he did (or deliberately failed to do). But it is still unclear to Padmé how whatever happened to the Force could have rendered Anakin _unconscious._

Shaking her head in half-denial, half-confusion, Padmé removes her hand from her mouth to speak.

“And it made him—” she searches, “ _physically_ ill?”

“Yes. Like I said, General Kenobi would know more about what exactly happened, but I wasn’t sure he would think to contact you.”

Yes, but Rex did think to tell her. Because Rex himself is one of the only people, besides Anakin and Padmé and a select few of her handmaidens, to know of their relationship. How many more _suspect_ but don’t say anything, she is unsure.

Padmé had been right: this _is very much_ forcing her life off its steady axis. She scrambles to come up with more concrete questions so that she might make sense of which way is up in her new world. The first she decides on is:

“When did this happen?”

“About an hour ago,” Rex winces.

An _hour_.

“And he’s still unconscious?”

“They gave him drugs,” Rex says, and still very little makes sense to Padmé.

“Drugs? Why?”

“To calm him down. He seemed to be in a lot of pain,” explains Rex.

The way Rex is looking at her feels dreadful. More serious than if he was just calling to tell her Anakin had a mental breakdown. She flashes back to the small loth cat her family had owned when she was a little girl. It had been hit by a speeder, and she remembers her parents sitting Padmé and Sola down and explaining how their pet was in so much pain, that it would be best to—

“But he’ll be okay?” Padmé asks, her voice cracking.

Rex stares at her. The chilling thought occurs to her that he is probably used to delivering news of a similar nature to the comrades of wounded soldiers.

“General Kenobi seemed concerned that whatever…damage there was to his mind could be severe. Possibly permanent.”

Permanent.

_Oh gods. Oh gods._

Padmé had thought she was as prepared as she could be to receive news of Anakin’s death in battle: he would be perfectly fine until she was told that he definitively was _not._ But this _uncertainty_ is worse than she could have imagined. And the fact that she still didn’t grasp how Anakin could have sustained possible _permanent damage_ despite nothing like an explosion, blaster bolt, or lightsaber even touching him made it that much worse.

Her hands shake under the desk. Bunching the fabric of her dress in her fists does nothing to stop it.

“I need to—I need to—” she gasps. Blessedly, Rex understands what she needs.

“I’m still at the Temple ma’am. I’m off duty now, I can get you inside.”

Yes. Yes. She needs to be with Anakin. She should have _insisted_ they be together as early as yesterday morning. And _oh_ , she can barely wrap her head around the kindness Rex is doing her with the offer. Surely, he is not supposed to let outsiders into the Jedi Temple. The fact that he even thought to call her—she knows Rex loved Ahsoka and a detached part of her recognizes what kind of upheaval Anakin’s incapacitation must create for him, even just logistically speaking.

The reminder that such kindness remains in this dark galaxy of theirs allows her to claw back some composure.

“Thank you, Captain,” she says, and she hopes he can tell she means it, “I’ll come right away.”

She does not remember ending the call, but she does recall telling Typho to take her to the Jedi Temple in the speeder. She remembers roughly wiping her face dry in the back seat. Steeling herself to argue with whatever Jedi Masters might try to prevent her from getting to Anakin. Rex said he can get her in the front door, but surely even he couldn’t get her into a restricted medical ward without any sort of confrontation. She registers being distantly being grateful that she dressed in appropriate senatorial garb this morning and did her hair, so that she will come across as legitimate enough to anyone she might have to go through.

There are still crowds of protesters gathered on the front steps of the Temple when she arrives, and Padmé forces her way through them with authority. Typho goes with her, but he can only do so much to hold back the press of the throng. Her shoulders are jostled and their yelling voices come too close to her ears, but they’re not yelling at her. They barely notice her. The ones that do try to move out of her way, maybe recognizing that she is a senator, maybe even hoping she’s come to support their cause. She hasn’t, which will hopefully become clear to whatever reporters that might spot her when she is seen calmly entering the building.

She doesn’t look up at the signs the protestors thrust into the air, fearing to see Ahsoka’s likeness paired with vile words. These people are anti-Jedi and anti-clone. These people are glad Ahsoka is dead. They think she’s a symbol of the corruption and evil of those who run the war. Padmé wonders how much they would change their tune if the army stood down, like they seem to want, and the Separatists arrived to sack Coruscant instead.

The worst part is that, if Ahsoka still lived, if Padmé’s or Anakin’s efforts had been successful, the crowds would be larger and the sentients here angrier. The public’s indignation has been at least partially sated by the death of an innocent sixteen-year-old girl. Padmé can barely stand to be among them a second longer.

Eventually, she emerges to the front of the crowd. There are soldiers there, holding back the throng from the Jedi Temple proper. She searches among their armor for the familiar royal blue of the 501st, looking for Rex. He is not among the ranks of the crowd-control and she finds him removed—lurking by a tall pillar—after several moments of looking for him. The pointed, stylized markings on his helmet are turned towards the crowd, so she knows he is looking for her. No sooner than she spots him does he begin to stride towards her. She must be easy to pick out: a single calm figure, not yelling or shaking her fists like the rest.

Rex says something to the two troopers on either side of her, and in the hubbub the sound is lost to her, but his words do their work and she is spit out onto the other side of the lines. Padmé takes the barest moment to release a sharp breath, shaking the unsettling clamor of the masses from her bones, before she begins purposefully climbing the steps. Rex is a step behind her.

Neither speaks until they are inside the building, the tumultuous shouts of the crowd having faded into the studious quiet of the Jedi’s ancestral home. The tumult in Padmé’s heart remains; she knows it will not subside until she sees Anakin and knows that he will come back to her. She dons the implacable mask of Queen Amidala on reflex, and wishes she had the face paint to go with it.

Padmé has no idea where the Halls of Healing are, but Rex does, and he takes the lead, guiding her through the sedate hallways. She can feel inquiring looks boring into her back from the Jedi they pass, but they are not stopped. These Jedi probably assume she was invited in by a Master with more authority than they; it would not be their place to question.

They pass through spaces she recognizes—unlike most outsiders, she has been inside this place a few times. There is the hallway that will eventually lead to the chamber where Jedi funerals are held. She attended Obi Wan’s faked service there some months ago. The Jedi believe that they become one with the Force if they die. Padmé supposes that’s comforting for one who has dedicated their life to it.

On Naboo, and in most other planetary religions for that matter, sentients retain their individuality after they die, able to watch over their descendants from the heavens in one way or another. The concept of yourself completely ceasing to exist and bleeding back into the uniform background noise of the universe, while the things that made you who you were become irrelevant, unnerves her. Still, she hopes that the Jedi religion is not one in which a proper burial is necessary for this to happen, because she’s not sure if Ahsoka will be afforded one after they expelled her. Ahsoka was raised as a Jedi from childhood; Padmé hopes she can find peace in the way of her people.

Finally, they come upon a large doorway with a numb-looking Padawan standing guard next to it. The teenage tholothian straightens as she catches sight of Padmé and Rex striding down the hall. Padmé elongates her strides to draw even with Rex and then reaches out to catch his arm. They both stop in the middle of the hallway.

“Thank you, Captain, I can take it from here,” she says to the dark slit in his helmet where she knows his kind eyes are watching her.

Rex hesitates and glances at the Padawan in the doorway, so she continues,

“I wouldn’t want to implicate you any further in something untoward.”

“Good luck, Senator,” Rex tells her, accepting her dismissal, “General Skywalker… he needs someone who understands with him, and I think you do.”

Padmé considers the helmeted clone beside her carefully. It is very nice to hear him say that.

“You seem to understand him as well, Rex,” she says, softly, “I am very grateful that he’s had you at his side these past years.”

Rex’s head briefly ducks down to look at the ground before he turns the visor towards her again.

“Go, be with your brothers,” she tells him, but it is not an order. Padmé has kept him from doing this as soon as he would have liked, she is sure. Her hand flutters up to clasp his arm—a familiar kind of gesture she might use on Bail as they wrap up a conversation about their personal lives—but she stops, not wanting to make Rex uncomfortable.

They both nod at each other, and Padmé turns, fixing the slip in her mask of calm. _No,_ she thinks, _I am not a wife here to keep vigil at her husband’s bedside, I am a galactic senator here on business with a Jedi Master. I have a right to be here._ The thing is, in either case, she has a right to be here. She is prepared to use that fact to the fullest if it becomes necessary.

“I’m looking for Master Kenobi,” Padmé tells the Padawan. The girl looks nervous but does an admirable job of politely deflecting her.

“I’m afraid Master Kenobi is busy at the moment, Senator Amidala.”

If Padmé were assigned this job, she might outright lie and say that Obi Wan was not there, but she supposes that’s one of the reasons she is not a Jedi.

“That’s alright, I’ll go to him, then. He’s expecting me.”

Obi Wan is not expecting her, but the Padawan doesn’t have to know that. Padmé marches forward through the doorway, acting as if this should be more than enough to convince the girl.

“Senator, this isn’t a place for—” the Padawan calls after her but does not make any move to prevent her advance.

The click of Padmé’s shoes against the smooth flooring is comforting as she leaves the entrance behind. The rest of the Temple she has seen has been carpeted—more lavishly in some places than others—but she supposes the kind of tile they have here is appropriate for a hospital. It is very slightly slick, probably cleaned recently. She spots a drop of blood—red and human—on the floor off to the side. The cleaning droid must have missed it.

Obi Wan steps out of a room down the hall and immediately spots her. His handsome face wears an expression of concerned confusion, but worse is the fact that his cream-colored robes have smears of blood on the sleeves. Padmé’s neck stiffens as she forces herself not to look back to the patch of floor she passed and its forgotten speck of red. Her next breath is shaky. She keeps walking.

Obi Wan strides towards her.

“Senator Amidala, what are you doing here?”

As they approach each other, Padmé does not slow her pace but merely angles herself so that she’ll pass him by. Anakin is in the room he just left and that is where she wants to be, not standing in a hallway arguing with Obi Wan.

But the Jedi master catches her arm and stops her as she tries to pass him. They stand, right-shoulder pressed to right-shoulder. Padmé doesn’t try to wrench her arm from his grip. He’s not hurting her and she’s not mad at him, but if he keeps her too long, she will be.

“You’re not allowed—” he continues.

“Anakin is here,” she explains simply, looking to the closed door from which he came, avoiding the way he is looking at her.

“Who told you—”

“What happened to him? I still don’t understand,” Padmé deflects.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Obi Wan tells her.

“I will not leave until I see him and you tell me how this happened,” she says harshly, keeping her tone just above a dangerous whisper. They are in a hospital, and there is no need to raise her voice when Obi Wan’s face is so close to her.

“This isn’t appropriate,” Obi wan protests, “I will inform you when something changes, but—”

“I don’t care if it’s appropriate—”

“It won’t be good for him to have you here. The code forbids attachment.”

Padmé thinks she knows what Obi Wan is thinking when he says this. Anakin’s former master knows there was an old flame between them, and that it is, at the very least, still glowing. If they had given each other up, Padmé would agree with Obi Wan that her presence would upset Anakin. Instead—

“Do you think Anakin cares about the code anymore? His Padawan is _dead_ , if you hadn’t noticed,” Padmé throws at him.

“Please, just give him time,” Obi Wan insists.

“I have a right!”

The fact had built in her until she couldn’t contain it anymore. Obi Wan draws back slightly but does not release her. His grip has remained firm but not tight.

“What do you mean?”

She really doesn’t want to explain herself if she doesn’t have to. After Geonosis, when they were not yet married, she visited Anakin while he was recovering from losing his arm—she should be allowed to visit him again. Maybe keeping the secret they had begun there, when they agreed to marry, doesn’t matter so much to either of them now, but she will still try.

“ _Please_ , Obi Wan, will he be alright?”

Obi Wan searches her face. She does not think he will let her comments be forgotten, even though he finally answers her.

“I do not know, Padmé.”

“When you say that, do you mean emotionally, or—”

“Either,” Obi Wan says, as she watches his face begin to crumble. Her own feels numb; she could not say what expression she wears.

She extricates herself from Obi Wan’s grip, taking advantage of his momentary weakness to move forward. Once she is a few steps away, Padmé realizes she misses the strange warmth that proximity to her friend had brought her.

Wrenching open the door Obi Wan came from, she finally sees Anakin for the first time since yesterday. He is pale, which makes the bruises under his eyes stand out more. He lies still and unconscious. Her eyes follow the length of wires that disappear under the collar of his tunic. The beeping that indicates his heart rate is her only reason to think he is alive at all.

A chair is askew by the left side of Anakin’s bed—presumably Obi Wan had vacated it—and Padmé sits, taking up Anakin’s hand in both of her own. An IV line is tucked into his left elbow.

The sound of Obi Wan’s boots pause in the doorway. She is still looking at Anakin when she asks,

“They don’t just hook up any grieving person to a heart monitor, Obi Wan. What’s wrong with him?”

Obi Wan’s Jedi robes rustle behind her until he enters her peripheral vison, leaning against the wall at the end of the bed.

“It’s complicated.”

“I’ve got time.”

“Deaths reverberate through the Force, Padmé. And Masters and Padawans are more attuned to each other in the Force than most. The connection can be shielded to different degrees, but Anakin and Ahsoka were most likely accustomed to a constant feel of the other’s presence, no matter where they were in space. When Ahsoka died, Anakin felt it and it damaged his mind—the part of it that he uses to connect with the Force. The mind healers call it psychic shock. It has a number of physical symptoms.”

The explanation of how the Force connects beings to one another is enlightening, and at another time, Padmé might be fascinated by it. Right now, she comes away with one question.

“You all understood that this would happen to him; there’s even a _name_ for it, yet you still let her die?”

“No, Padmé. It was well within Anakin’s capabilities to cut the connection safely and prevent this.”

Indignation stirs in Padmé’s heart.

“ _Cut the connection_ , Obi Wan, do you hear yourself? I thought you of all people understood what she was to him.”

Obi Wan sighs audibly—not annoyed but distressed.

“Yes, Padmé, I understand now why he would not have done so.”

From what she can tell, Obi Wan has been, for the most part, with Anakin since it happened. Anakin was Obi Wan’s Padawan: the same way Ahsoka was Anakin’s. She thinks he is telling the truth about understanding. And she can understand too. She understands perfectly well why Anakin would risk himself, but still she selfishly wishes he hadn’t.

Padmé rubs her thumb methodically over Anakin’s knuckles, focusing all her attention on the feel of the ridges there.

“What _are_ the symptoms, then? Is there—is there a treatment for this?”

It is still strange to think of a spiritual ailment translating to the physical.

“The healers can use crystals to speed along the healing, but the only real treatment is time. As for symptoms: severe headaches, nosebleeds, confusion—”

This explains what some of what Rex had told her, and the blood she saw. How much did he loose, or is the pallor of his skin due simply to exhaustion? But Obi Wan clearly is leaving something out.

“What else?” Padmé’s voice is hard. She must know.

“In rare cases, hallucinations, insanity, or—or loss of brain activity altogether,” Obi Wan tells her, haltingly.

“Is this a rare case?” she dares to ask.

“Even if we knew that yet, which we do not, I shouldn’t be telling you. There are privacy laws for this sort of thing.”

Though their postures would not reveal it, Obi Wan and Padmé are now taking defensive positions, readying to go to battle over Anakin. Padmé examines the veins and tendons in her husband’s hand very closely. A complicated machine, to match the one on his other side. She speaks.

“There are also laws that call for the fair treatment of children in Republic courts. The prohibition of capital punishment for minors. Or has the Jedi Council deemed itself worthy to pick and choose which laws it will or will not obey?”

“Ahsoka was a military officer, which made her equal to any other defendant in a military court,” Obi Wan returns, sounding weary. The words are not his own. The council’s party line.

“What I want to know is why you think you are entitled to be here,” he says.

Fine. Fine. She hopes Anakin will forgive her for doing this without asking him about it first. She suspects he might. Padmé cannot imagine he might still care about adhering to Jedi protocol, or about doing _anything_ they want, after this. She squeezes Anakin’s hand a little tighter.

“Under Republic law, a wife has the right to act as her husband’s medical proxy.”

Obi Wan is silent. When Padmé finally looks at him, his eyes are closed, and he pinches the bridge of his nose between his thumb and index finger.

“Wife,” he says finally, flatly, “you’re married.”

“Yes. And it’s a good thing we are,” says Padmé, looking over her husband’s prone body. He needs someone to take care of him right now, and she is glad that person will be her, even if it will be difficult. They exchanged the old, traditional Naboo vows: _in sickness or health, for better or worse_.

Obi Wan neither says anything to approve nor condemn. He simply tells her, “I’ll let the healers know you can stay,” and leaves.

When the door clicks shut behind him, the words that echo in her head are not about their marriage. They are Obi Wan’s voice saying _insanity or loss of brain activity altogether_ and Rex’s _possibly permanent,_ punctuated by the beeps of the heart monitor.

Padmé bows her head—presses her forehead to the back of Anakin’s too-still hand that lies on the bed—and weeps. She weeps for her husband, and for their lost almost-daughter. She weeps for the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Padmé and Rex are the ONLY ONES that were keeping the Clone Wars disaster family from descending into chaos. And now both are PO'ed and hurting, so things are rough.
> 
> Padmé, like Anakin, is really hurt by Ahsoka's death. And she has the added stress of worrying about Anakin, and of course she notices more about the politics of the situation that he does. Hopefully I did her character justice here, because I love her.
> 
> I'll keep adding chapters from various POVs to this angst-fest as I get the inspiration, so I'm marking this story as incomplete for now.

**Author's Note:**

> Did I write Dave Filoni's art into my fic? https://twitter.com/dave_filoni/status/1251238539213168640
> 
> Yes. Yes I did.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Come Marching Home](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27782926) by [Starthewolf1106](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starthewolf1106/pseuds/Starthewolf1106)




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